1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to retrieving web pages in an Internet environment. More particularly, the invention relates to a method, apparatus, and article of manufacture for cataloging bookmark information collected by a browser application.
2. Background of the Related Art
The World Wide Web, i.e., the “Web”, is the Internet's multimedia information retrieval system. It is the most commonly used method of transferring data in the Internet environment. Client machines accomplish transactions to Web servers using hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), which is a known application protocol providing users access to files, e.g., text, graphics, images, sound, video, and the like using a standard page description language known as Hypertext Markup Language (HTML). HTML provides basic document formatting and allows a developer to specify “links” to other servers and files. In the Internet paradigm, a network path to a server is identified by a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) having a special syntax for defining a network connection.
Retrieval of information is generally achieved by the use of an HTML-compatible “browser”, e.g. Netscape Navigator, installed on a client machine. When a user of the browser specifies a link via a URL, the client issues a request to a naming service to map a hostname in the URL to a particular network IP address at which the server is located. The naming service returns a list of one or more IP addresses that can respond to the request. Using one of the IP addresses, the browser establishes a connection to a server. If the server is available, it returns a document or other object formatted according to HTML.
Since the IP addresses returned to the client may be very lengthy, browsers offer a bookmark system for the creation of a bookmark list. The bookmark serves as a shortcut to go to a specific address previously bookmarked by the user.
Once created, bookmarks offer a technique for rapid page retrieval. The user can cause the browser to display his bookmark list and select among his bookmarks to go directly to a specific web page. Thus, the user is not required to enter a lengthy URL, or retrace the original route through the Internet by which he may have arrived at the Web site. Once the bookmark is added to the bookmark list, in general, the bookmark becomes a permanent part of the browser until removed.
Despite their usefulness, the current arrangement of bookmarks is not without flaws. As the number of web sites and web pages on these sites have increased dramatically, so have the number of bookmarks that a user maintains on his browser. It is not uncommon to have hundreds of bookmarks stored in a bookmark file by a user. Furthermore, the bookmarks may be generated and conveniently shared from various platform sources and locations, such as a desktop browser, a portable laptop, cellular phone, set-top box, personal data assistants, and the like. As a result, problems often arise while the user of the browser attempts to manage the bookmark list. Such problems include unmanageable growth of the bookmark list, loss of time in searching through the bookmarks, distinguishing which bookmarks are important or irrelevant, and the like.